Monday, May 21, 2007

Meet the Queen of Lefties

Over the weekend I met a 103-year-old woman. I sat with her at an event while her son went to bring the car around for her wheelchair. Despite her physical weakness, she is mentally sharp and can talk up a storm.

While we waited for her son, she said, “I’m always left waiting. I should be called ‘Lefty.’” That gave me a chuckle, of course. It turns out that she is also left-handed. She was born in England, and when she was 3 (1907!), she attended school for the first time. The teacher would tie Old Lady Lefty’s left hand behind her back so she was forced to use her right hand. Old Lady Lefty (OLL) said she made such a fuss about it that the teacher finally gave up.

Later, the family moved to the United States. The only way for OLL to attend high school was on scholarship. Some organization gave her $8 per week to go to high school.

Now, she’s stuck in her wheelchair waiting for other people to take her places. I wonder what life would be like for me at 103.

This site uses third-party advertising companies to serve ads. These companies may use information (not including your name, address, email address, or telephone number) about your visits to this and other websites in order to provide advertisements about goods and services of interest to you. If you would like more information about this practice and to know your choices about not having this information used by these companies, click here.